Hell or High Water: The

Return of the Western

By Sandra Olmsted

Hell or High Water is a tongue-in-cheek, thrillingly fun, darkly comic, and heart-felt gallop through the Western genre. Set in the familiar territory of sun-baked Texas, director David Mackenzie’s Neo-Western has the look and feel of a John Ford Western, pays homage to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), and owes a bit to Bonnie and Clyde (1967).

The heroes, or rather antiheroes, of the film are brothers Toby (Chris Pine) and Tanner (Ben Foster), who are on a quest to save the family ranch from foreclosure by an unscrupulous bank. All the characters blamed banks and aren’t really sorry to see them robbed, which is a theme in Ford’s Stagecoach (1939). Toby is the good one, who stayed close while mom died, shortly after she signed the ranch over to the bank on a reverse mortgage.

Tanner is the bad one, who mom didn’t even call when she was dying or leave any share of the ranch. Toby and Tanner embark on a spree of bank robberies, where they only take the small bills from the cash drawers because all they need is enough to pay the bank back the relatively small amount mom got before dying.

Although the brothers are armed, they avoid times of the day when the banks are crowded because don’t want to hurt anyone beyond a few punches when the bank employees don’t cooperate, at least Toby doesn’t. Tanner has a sociopathic streak. They use stolen cars, which they bury on the ranch after one or two heists. At least that is their plan, until things start to go wrong, and until two Texas Rangers set out to end the brothers’ winning streak. The about-to-retire head Ranger, Marcus Hamilton (Jeff Bridges), constantly, gleefully needles his successor, Alberto Parker (Gil Birmingham) in completely inappropriate ways, which casts Hamilton in a negative light. The realism of Hamilton’s verbal abuse and Alberto’s long-suffering reactions, however, reveal Hamilton’s fear of retirement and Alberto’s impatience for the final weeks of Hamilton’s tenure as his boss to end.

Toby and Tanner’s histories, motivations, and desires also roll out naturally in screenwriter Taylor Sheridan’s unexpected plot twists and cleverly tight, crisp dialogue, which is easily the best of the year. David Mackenzie’s direction electrifies every moment with emotion and taut urgency, and Sheridan’s script makes the brothers and the Rangers achingly human, imbruing the characters with life. Foster’s maniacal joy, Pine’s determined resolve, Bridges’ underlying fear, and Birmingham’s stoic anger evoke the seemingly one-dimensional cowboys in John Ford’s Western, which were always revealed to have many more depths to plumb, and these actors reveal those depths with just the right nuance, timing, and chemistry.

The film even looks like The Searchers (1956), but under big skies and on rocky crags of West Texas, it is muscle cars and SUVs that the cowboys ride to escape or to rescue. Rated R for some strong violence, language throughout, and brief sexuality and running a lean 102 minutes, this Neo-Western updates the tropes and conventions of the classic Western, making the genre relevant to today’s issues and audiences. Hell or High Water, a CBS Films release, is in theaters now, and if you are planning to see only one film this week or even this month, I reckon, it should be Hell or High Water.

   HELL OR HIGH WATER: Brothers Toby (Chris Pine) and Tanner (Ben Foster), are on a quest to save the family ranch from foreclosure by an unscrupulous bank in this dark comedy.

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